You're missing my point. MVC was just one example. Also you created a false dichotomy: picking tools that only the best and brightest understand is not what I'm arguing for.

Should we as a team avoid using React simply because someone on the team isn't a JavaScript expert yet? Or is it better to just roll our own view rendering library?

The argument has no logic to it. Yes I agree that throwing some monolith framework at every problem you encounter is not a good idea, but that's a far cry from "don't waste your time with express, just do your own http!"

As Graham Lyons pointed out you might as well be advocating that we simply write everything in machine code.